blauth
Race Dog
Chaps, I'm sorting my DRZ400 out to my taste but the front suspension is very harsh. The bike doesn't seem plush over small sharp hits I.e. The high speed compression is up to shit. It deflects of small rocks and stuff, so the bike doesn't track nicely. The bottoming resistance seems fine, I don't think I've come close to bottoming out the bike. Static sag seems a bit small in the front as does rider sag when I sit on the bike. I don't think the poor high speed compression would emanate from static sag being to little, if anything static sag that is too much may result in the fork working too far into the stroke and thus becoming harsh. Note, there doesn't appear to be a pre-load adjuster on the fork.
Some comments:
- My compression clickers are on their softest damping setting
- I've removed the front wheel and realigned it. I did not release the triple clamps and pump the forks a few times before tightening things up again.....must check this still.
Now, reading a bit, this bike had cartridge type forks and there are effectively two sets of shim stacks; one for compression and one for rebound. Now from what I understand, the compression shim stack is also sort of divided into two areas, one for the slow speed comp damping and the other bit for high speed compression damping. I've also read that this is a characteristic of the DRZ forks. Personally, I like the conventional fork (seals give less kak) and the DRZ fork has a huge diameter stansion for a conventional fork for rigidity so I like the platform but this harshness is really unpleasant.
The standard fork oil weight is 5w.
I weigh about 88kg plus gear, maybe 10kg.
I'm not interested in spending crap loads of cash on revalving and over capitalizing on the bike so my questions are:
1) if I put 2.5w (versus the std 5w) oil in, will it improve the harshness on the high speed compression?
2) will the 2.5w oil adversely effect the bottoming out resistance.
3) I've had some success in the past with WP forks to get rid of some of the harshness by increasing the air gap. The DRZ std is 122mm. Maybe increase this to 135mm?
4) what adverse effects are there to increasing the air gap?
5) has anyone got a proven method to reduce the harshness of this fork without spending bucket loads of cash?
Some comments:
- My compression clickers are on their softest damping setting
- I've removed the front wheel and realigned it. I did not release the triple clamps and pump the forks a few times before tightening things up again.....must check this still.
Now, reading a bit, this bike had cartridge type forks and there are effectively two sets of shim stacks; one for compression and one for rebound. Now from what I understand, the compression shim stack is also sort of divided into two areas, one for the slow speed comp damping and the other bit for high speed compression damping. I've also read that this is a characteristic of the DRZ forks. Personally, I like the conventional fork (seals give less kak) and the DRZ fork has a huge diameter stansion for a conventional fork for rigidity so I like the platform but this harshness is really unpleasant.
The standard fork oil weight is 5w.
I weigh about 88kg plus gear, maybe 10kg.
I'm not interested in spending crap loads of cash on revalving and over capitalizing on the bike so my questions are:
1) if I put 2.5w (versus the std 5w) oil in, will it improve the harshness on the high speed compression?
2) will the 2.5w oil adversely effect the bottoming out resistance.
3) I've had some success in the past with WP forks to get rid of some of the harshness by increasing the air gap. The DRZ std is 122mm. Maybe increase this to 135mm?
4) what adverse effects are there to increasing the air gap?
5) has anyone got a proven method to reduce the harshness of this fork without spending bucket loads of cash?
